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Home > Sangre Celestial > Chekhov + ‘The Makanai’: Paul and Chris Weitz share nutritious Treats
Podcast: Sangre Celestial
Episode:

Chekhov + ‘The Makanai’: Paul and Chris Weitz share nutritious Treats
Category: Arts
Duration: 00:00:00
Publish Date: 2025-08-23 16:00:00
Description: Filmmaking brothers Chris and Paul Weitz have been collaborating for over two decades as writers, directors, and producers. They rose to prominence with the iconic 1999 teen comedy American Pie, followed by the critically acclaimed About a Boy (2002), the latter of which earned them an Academy Award nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay. Now, they’ve reunited for a new project: Murderbot, an Apple TV+ series based on Martha Wells’ All Systems Red: The Murderbot Diaries. A second season of Murderbot was recently announced. More: Chris and Paul Weitz on knowing Alexander Skarsgård was their Murderbot (The Treatment, 2025) For their Treat, the Weitz brothers each reveal an individual inspiration. Paul reflects on a moment of discovery when he came across a copy of Chekhov’s plays on his grandparents' bookshelf when he was 16. He was struck by Chekhov’s talent for blending tragedy and comedy through flawed characters. Chris, meanwhile, shows some love for the 2023 Netflix drama series The Makanai: Cooking for the Maiko House. He was drawn to the show’s low-stakes storytelling and structure, which hammered home the thought that even small, everyday goals can carry weight within a larger narrative. This segment has been edited and condensed for clarity. Paul Weitz: The thing that influenced me the most, creatively, was at age 16, I ran across a copy of Chekhov's plays in my grandparents' bookshelf, and there was a particular translation by Stark Young, who was a critic in the ‘50s. In his introduction, he said, "When Chekhov's character says, I'm bored, I'm bored, I'm bored, I'm bored, most translators will say I'm bored. This is incredibly tiresome. I can't listen to this anymore." But he said, "I'm just gonna say I'm bored. I'm bored, I'm bored, I'm bored." Then the plays themselves seem so incredibly pertinent and modern. You would make judgments about characters and then, only because they're acting like people would actually act, you'd have to change your judgment as it went along. A posed photograph of Anton Chekhov reading his play “The Seagull” to the Moscow Art Theatre company (1898). Photo credit: Petr Pavlov/Wikimedia Creative Commons In The Seagull, you have Dr. Astro [Editor’s note: the character’s name is Dr. Dorn] who is this incredibly worthy person with noble intent, but eventually just falls for this actress who's the wife of the professor… whose country estate they're on. You have people who are self-destructive and it's also very funny. All the plays are really funny. This idea that the most accurate way of portraying people is to have it be some mix of tragedy and comedy was something that I [was] set on the path of by those plays. --- Chris Weitz: [My Treat is] a Japanese television show called The Makanai: Cooking for the Geisha House. [Editor’s note: the show title is The Makanai: Cooking for the Maiko House]. It is a show run by Hirokazu Kore-eda, who is an amazing Japanese director. It is about these two young girls who want to become geisha[s] in present day Kyoto. One of them is clearly cut out to be the Michael Jordan of geisha. The other one is hapless, but becomes the cook for the rest of the geisha trainees. It is incredibly low stakes. One of the big stakes is like: “Is Kiyo-chan gonna make it to the top of this mountain in order to complete her thing for the festival or not? Is she gonna win the special microwave that she wants?” That kind of thing. I think within the world that it frames, these very small things are incredibly important. Then the things that feel incredibly important have this aspect of the mundane to them as well. Yeah, it’s brilliant.
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